[Info-vax] OT: IA-128 ???

[Arne Vajhøj]

Richard B. Gilbert wrote:
> Arne Vajhøj wrote:
>> Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>>> In article <008e4785$0$5058$c3e8da3 at news.astraweb.com>,
>>>     JF Mezei <jfmezei.spamnot at vaxination.ca> writes:
>>>> Neil Rieck wrote:
>>>>> IA-128 ???
>>>> Considering that it will be a long while before the 64 bit memopry
>>>> barriers are broken, a real need for 128 bits is still some
>>>> years/decades away. 
>>>
>>> And no one will ever need more than 640K of memory.
>>
>> I don't think anyone doubt that we will need 128 bit computers
>> at some point in time.
>>
>> But not in 2012-2013 where Windows 8 is planned.
>>
>> When this news was discussed in another forum I suggested
>> a rule saying that the number of bits required doubles
>> every year.
>>
>> Not a very precise rules. But it gives some indication of how
>> far out the 128 bit is.
> 
> Why should we need 128 bit computers any time soon?  ISTR when 64 bit 
> first came out that it was claimed that 64 bits was enough to enumerate 
> the fundamental particles in the universe or something like that.

It is not.

> Can anyone afford enough RAM to populate a 128 bit address space?  For 
> that matter, how about enough RAM for a How about a 64 bit address 
> space?  Has anyone got enough data about anything or everything to fully 
> occupy such an address space?

You can today buy more RAM than 32 bit can address (now we are back
at physical addresses, but ...) for a few hundred dollars.

It does not appear unlikely that sometime out in 2030-2040 you
will be able to buy EB's of RAM.

Arne